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Former general pleads guilty to maltreating subordinate under his command

DURHAM, N.C. — Brig. Gen. Jeffery Sinclair formally pleaded guilty Monday morning to maltreating a subordinate under his command, telling a military judge in halting voice that he deceived her during their illicit three-year affair and caused her “emotional distress.”

Sinclair, one of only a handful of generals to face a court-martial in the past 60 years, also pleaded guilty to twice misusing his government charge card to pursue the affair, disobeying an order not to contact his mistress, and making derogatory comments about other female officers. The military judge, Col. James L. Pohl, accepted the pleas.

—Los Angeles Times

Earthquake strikes near LA

LOS ANGELES — A magnitude-4.4 earthquake that struck near Westwood provided an early morning jolt for Greater Los Angeles, but there were no immediate reports of damage or injuries.

The quake struck at 6:25 a.m. PDT at a depth of 5.3 miles, according to the U.S. Geological Survey. The quake was centered near the intersection of Mulholland Drive and the 405 Freeway.

—Los Angeles Times

Man accused in Craiglist rapes pleads guilty

CHICAGO — Charles Oliver, who was accused of raping eight women he met on Craigslist and other dating sites, pleaded guilty to two more counts of sexual assault Monday.

Convicted by a McHenry County, Ill., jury last month in the first case, Oliver calmly agreed to the plea deal in court this morning and now stands to receive a prison term of 20 to 93 years when he’s sentenced in May.

In exchange for his guilty plea, the state’s attorney’s office agreed to end the remaining cases against him and not prosecute him for any additional victims, should they be identified among the large volume of video footage confiscated from Oliver’s Woodstock home that showed him having sex with various women.

—Chicago Tribune

Mike Jagger’s girlfriend found dead

L’Wren Scott, Mick Jagger’s girlfriend and a prominent fashion designer whose fans included some of the most powerful women in America, was found dead in an apartment in New York City on Monday morning, according to police and local media reports.

The 49-year-old’s boyfriend, Rolling Stones singer Jagger, who was on tour in Australia at the time of the discovery, “is completely shocked and devastated by the news,” his spokesman said.

An unnamed law enforcement official told the Associated Press that the death was a possible suicide.

—Los Angeles Times

Third person injured in South by Southwest crash dies

HOUSTON — A third person injured in last week’s South by Southwest crash has died.

Sandy Thuy Le, 26, had been treated at University Medical Center Brackenridge in Austin, Texas, where relatives announced her death Monday.

Le, of Pass Christian, Miss., was injured after being hit by a car outside the Mohawk nightclub last Thursday, a spokeswoman for the Travis County Medical Examiner’s Office told KVUE.

—Los Angeles Times

Polygamist sect leader hospitalized in Texas

HOUSTON — Polygamist sect leader Warren Jeffs, who has been serving a life sentence in Texas prison, has been hospitalized, officials said.

Jeffs was in stable condition Monday at a Galveston hospital, where he was admitted March 11 for treatment of a non-life-threatening condition, according to Texas Department of Criminal Justice spokesman Robert Hurst.

DETROIT — Scott Asheton, whose hard-hitting drumming was the bedrock of the Stooges’ influential sound, died Sunday. He was 64.

The cause of death is not known. It was acknowledged by bandmate Iggy Pop on social media and confirmed by the group’s publicist Nasty Little Man.

Iggy Pop is now the only surviving member of the original Stooges lineup, whose raucous work helped define Detroit’s rock identity while serving as a bridge between ’60s rock and the subsequent punk explosion.

—Detroit Free Press

Putin issues decree recognizing Crimea as sovereign government

Russian President Vladimir Putin issued a decree recognizing Crimea as a “sovereign and independent government” following a controversial vote on the Russian-occupied peninsula to secede from Ukraine, the Kremlin news service announced late Monday.

The swift official recognition of the vote Sunday engineered by Russian nationalists installed in the regional leadership just two weeks ago was likely to enflame an already tense standoff between the Kremlin and an interim leadership in Kiev, the Ukrainian capital, which branded the secession vote illegal and provocative.

—Los Angeles Times

Obama signs order imposing sanctions on Russian government officials

WASHINGTON — President Barack Obama has signed an order that imposes sanctions on seven Russian government officials, including a deputy prime minister and one of President Vladimir Putin’s closest advisers.

In a statement, the White House said Russia’s incursion in Crimea undermined “democratic processes and institutions in Ukraine; threaten its peace, security, stability, sovereignty, and territorial integrity.”

The sanctions also targeted Ukraine’s ousted pro-Russia president, Viktor Yanukovych, his chief of staff and two Crimea-based separatist leaders.

—Tribune Washington Bureau

US Navy SEALS seize control of oil tanker

CAIRO — U.S. Navy SEALs seized control of an oil tanker that had illegally taken on a cargo of crude oil peddled by rebels in Libya who had earlier captured key oil ports, the U.S. military announced early Monday.

The seaborne raid, staged off of the Cypriot coast, came at the behest of the governments of both Libya and Cyprus, the Pentagon said in a statement.

“No one was hurt tonight when U.S. forces…boarded and took control of the commercial tanker Morning Glory,” the statement said.

The SEAL team, backed by helicopters, launched its operation late Sunday local time from the U.S. guided missile destroyer Roosevelt, the Pentagon said.

—Los Angeles Times

Search continues for missing plan

BEIJING — The search for missing Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 has expanded to cover an impossibly vast swath of Asia extending from Kazakhstan to Australia, with Malaysia appealing for as many airplanes and ships as the world can provide.

The countries where the Boeing 777 and the 239 people aboard could have gone, based on a signal picked up by a satellite, stretch north and west from the plane’s last known location and include Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Pakistan, Bangladesh, India, China, Myanmar, Laos, Vietnam and Thailand. Another arc stretches south and west between Indonesia and Australia and well into the Indian Ocean.

—Los Angeles Times

Police photos show unexplained drops of blood in former Olympian’s bedroom

JOHANNESBURG — Police photographs show unexplained drops of blood on the wall above the left-hand bedside table and bed headboard and on the duvet in the main bedroom of South African Olympic athlete Oscar Pistorius, according to evidence at his trial Monday.

The blood spatters appear to have been some distance from the trail of blood leading from the bathroom out into the hall, left when Pistorius carried his dying girlfriend, Reeva Steenkamp, down stairs from the bathroom where he shot her.

—Los Angeles Times

Paris implements measures aimed at reducing smog levels

PARIS — Paris enjoyed a rare reprieve from traffic jams Monday as a draconian clampdown on cars, aimed at banishing stubborn levels of smog, took effect.

Only cars and motorcycles with registration numbers ending in an odd number were allowed onto the streets of the French capital on Monday. Close to 4,000 motorists with plates ending in an even number who slipped behind the wheel had received on the spot $30 fines by midday.

The measure was announced by the national government at the weekend as a way of trying to lift the cloud of particle pollution that has hung over the city for the past week, cloaking the Eiffel Tower and other monuments in a gray sheen.

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